My July 4th Cook (ok, so I'm doing it on July 5th)


 
K

Kevin Mahler

TVWBB Member
Yesterday I packed up my new WSM and heading down to Mom's house (about an hour south). Spent last night at my Dad's on the James River watching fireworks and having banana splits. We could see about 10 different fireworks displays from his balcony.

I had asked Mom to get two 6 lbs Pork Shoulders (Boston Butts). She was only able to find 4 pounders so she got four of them. They were labeled "Pork Butt" but after doing a little research they seemed to be the right cut of meat. My Ukrops in Richmond has nice large ones labeled "Boston Butt". I also had her get some Spare ribs and I brought a rack of Baby Backs with me.

My sister mixed the rubs while I applied it to the meats. I used a Butt rub from this site that I've used before. For the ribs I made the Texas Sugarless Rib Rub. I can't wait to see how it comes out.

This morning I was up at 6am and got the WSM going for the first time. After the coals were set (Minion), I placed three racks of ribs and the four Butts on the smoker.

The Butts seem to be heating up quite a bit faster than the larger ones I get at Ukrops. After only 3 hours they are at 170 with the smoker holding a steady 250 degrees. I have the three bottom vents at 25% and the top at 100% with a thermometer in one of the holes.

I broke out the camera and took a few pics. I think we are going to have plenty of leftovers since there are only 10 people coming over this evening.

I plan to make Ladybird Johnson's BBQ sauce, No. 5 and one of my own concoctions.

I'll post some follow up photos when everything is done.

My first cook in my WSM

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My weapons of choice

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Holding rock solid at 250

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My cooking partner, Keyser Soze

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From Mom's Flower Garden (or me playing with my 60mm Macro)

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Great pics! (Keyser reminds me a lot of mine. Don't have a pic of him on the computer.)

Howz the food coming?
 
Hello Kevin,
I to am doing the 4th cookout on the 5th. I started last night around 11:30pm with 1 8# and 1 6# bosten butts found them at Sams Club. I used yellow mustered and Bad Byrons Butt Rub. Let them sit over night. Fired the wsms up last night stayed up untill around 12:30 temp holding at 250. Went to bed up at 7 everything going good. Temp down to 230 add some more coals. Meat temp at 285 on smaller one and 275 on bigger one. Small butt temp at 205 by 9 am it is resting. Bigger one up to 195 and it is getting ready 2 come off and rest. I love night cooks. I have to find things to keep me busy if I do them during the day. Anyway ood luck with your cook.
 
Now 5 hours into the cook. The Butts are starting to show signs of bark. They are about 180 degrees at this point. This is the first time I didn't rub the meat down with mustard before applying the rubs. I have heard the argument both ways and thought I would try it without the mustard to decide for myself.

I ran up to the hardware store and purchased some heavy duty rubber gloves for handling the meat. I'm still learning.

I'm really starting to worry that the Butts will be ready far too early. I've never had Butts cook this quickly. I guess it's because they are small but I thought having four of them plus 3 racks of ribs on the cooker would keep it consistent with larger Butts. Then again, my ECB never held the temperature as steady as my WSM is currently.

As for the pictures, one of my other many hobbies is photography. I took these with my D1X with my 60mm Macro lens.

I have plenty more here.
 
Well, one mystery solved. I just moved the temp probes to the other two butts. Apparently, even though I thought I had be careful not to, I had the probes very close to the bone. Now the butts are reading around 163 degrees which is more in line with what I would expect after 6 hours.
 
The first set of ribs came out of the smoker and the second set are now cooking.

This is what the first set look like.

The Baby Backs
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The Spare Ribs
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How American is this?
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The food looks great!

I'm doing my 4th of July cook on the 5th as well. A couple racks of ribs + a bunch of ABTs. I'll start a new thread with some pics so as not to totally hijack.
 
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